Playing Your Position
Article Sponsored by the Team at Online Poker Rakeback
As any experienced poker player will tell you, poker is not just a game of cards. Poker is a game of psychological warfare, with a felt battlefield and mental ammunition. It’s not always the player with the best cards who wins – it’s the player who can make everyone else at the table believe he has the best cards who takes the pot.
Now you’re probably asking yourself, “Does this guy want me to bluff every bad hand?” Absolutely not. But when the situation calls for it, by all mean, yes!
Now you’re probably wondering what this has to do with playing your position in poker. That’s simple enough. When you’re in the best position – late position – you have the greatest opportunity to claim a sizeable pot with a terrible hand. This won’t happen every time, but it can certainly come in handy when your opponents haven’t a leg to stand on.
We’ll start by detailing the advantages of being in late position, and how to make the most of this situation. Then we’ll discuss early and middle position betting. Practice your table position strategy at the best poker sites.
Late Position
What makes this the best position to be in is that you have the opportunity to observe everyone else’s reaction to their own hand before making a move. Late position is one of three seats – on the button, in the small blind, or in the big blind. On the button offers the best advantage since you are not forced to invest in the hand before making your decision.
Late position offers the strongest opportunity to bluff, or at least semi-bluff. In order to do so, you’ll need a few things to happen first. Watch the early and middle position bettors. If they are showing little confidence in their hands, limping into the pot or making minimal raises at best, you can safely assume they are going to fold to a threatening raise or re-raise. The best case scenario is for most of these players to fold out before you even have the chance to raise the pot. When there are one or two players remaining, none with a solid hand, a simple raise of substantial size will result in an immediate stealing of the blinds.
Early Position
As you may have guessed, this is the worst position to be in. You are not afforded the opportunity to read anyone, and must decided, based on your own hand strength alone, whether you’re willing to make an investment. Should you decide to invest, are you willing to pay more to protect your investment? What if the button raises you back? Are you going to call it? You have to know this answer before it happens, because if you’re going to fold, just do it now instead of losing an initial investment.
If you do decide to invest in the pot from early position, don’t limp in. Place a decent enough raise that will tell the late position bettor you are not playing around. This will stop him from attempting to steal the blinds. If he thinks you will call his bluff, he’s not going to bother. The only time you should limp in from early position is with a premium starting hand, like pocket Aces. In this case, you are bluffing with a small bet to entice a raise from late position. When he raises, you either call or re-raise. If you want the hand to continue to the Flop, call. If you want to take the pot early, raise.
Middle Position
Middle position is much like early position, except that you will at least get to read a few players before acting. You still have to decide whether you’re going to make an investment, and whether it’s worth protecting should another player raise. Bluffing is out of the question, but semi-bluffing might be of use, if all early position bettors fold out. The advantage of the semi-bluff is that you actually have some kind of hand to fall back on, should you get called. You’ll have to make a sizeable wager here if you want it to work, though.
